Musing, rants and flim-flammery

Category Archives: Gadgets and Tech

I won a pair of AFTERSHOKZ Bluez 2 Wireless Headphones via Athletics Weekly, which arrived in the post last week.
Within seconds of shutting the front door on the postman, I’d opened the AFTERSHOKZ Blue 2 Wireless Headphones box, and in very little time I’d connected them to my computer to charge via the USB port.
I’ve used the wireless headphones a few times since I received them.Positive Points:

Audio quality is very good.

Bluetooth range is about 4 metres.

You can make and receive calls via the headset.

About 6 hours battery life.

Now the negative points:

Not comfortable to wear with glasses.

Lots of sound leakage at higher volume.

Expensive.

Headband is non adjustable.

Summary:
Would I buy the AFTERSHOKZ Blue 2 Wireless Headphones?
No, and most definitely not for £90.
That said, I will use them occasionally – after all they were free. 😀

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Last year we purchased a rechargeable torch for when we walk the dog at night. It was utter rubbish. A 20 hour charge only last 20 minutes. This winter we decided to replace it with a wind-up torch.
After searching on Amazon I decided on the Duronic Hurricane 4 in 1.
Duronic Hurricane 4 in 1 arrived the next day after I ordered it. I’ve used it a few times now and it works very well. The torch is nice and bright and casts a good beam of light. The lantern is also very bright and will come in useful if we experience any power cuts. There is also a red flashing light. Not really sure what use it will be for me.
You can also charge your phone etc. via the built-in USB port. A very handy little feature.

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A little while ago I purchased a Smartphone Fisheye Lens from Lidl in Peterlee. It was a little gift for Mrs.R. It cost about £5.
We have both used the fisheye lens a few times on our iPhones, and we think it is utter rubbish.
There is hardly any fisheye effect at all. It is also very fiddly to position correctly over the lens on the iPhone.
The Smartphone Fisheye Lens is a complete waste of money. It is now on the way to a local charity shop.
Maybe someone else will enjoy using it, as it might work better on a different make of mobile phone.

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I use a lot of USB devices and it is a real pain getting to the USB ports on my iMac because they are tucked away at the back. To save myself the hassle, I decided to buy a USB hub. After a little research I decided upon the Easyacc® Aluminum Superspeed USB 3.0 7 Port Charging Station Hub. It had good reviews on Amazon and fitted my needs.
It’s got 7 USB port, two of which are charging ports. This means I can charge both my iPhone and iPad at the same time. The build quality also seems very good and it has a power on/off button, which is useful. All in all a very handy gadget to compliment my iMac.

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I now have a new iMac.
I decided I needed a large capacity external hard-drive to store all of my media files, so that I can keep the iMac’s hard-drive free for Apps/software.
So far, I’ve added 36,000+ jpg’s, 7,000+ mp3’s, and about 1,500 mp4’s.
These files have only made a small dent in the 4TB’s of storage, about a 600 GB dent.
The WD My Book Studio 4TB USB 3.0 Desktop Storage, worked straight out of the box. It was Plug & Play. Simple. It should provide at least a couple of years of storage for all of the photos I shoot, and videos I make. By then I’m sure there will be 50 TB’s external hard-drives on the market for the same price, and not much bigger in size.
I decided on a WD My Book Studio 4TB, because I already own two WD 1TB portable hard-drives, and I’ve never had any trouble with either of them. One of them, I purchased in Bangkok, Thailand which then spent 18 months travelling the World with me, and suffering many different climatic conditions, survived without any issues – so I am confident that this one will last for many years, as it is only going to live on my desk and not be globetrotting.

When we moved into our new house in Easington Colliery, we needed fast internet access.
We did not think that this would be a major issue because we both had unlimited data plans on our iPhone’s. The only problem was the fact we could not pick up a 3G signal in the house, and could only get a phone signal if the phone was placed right next to the window.
This meant we needed to set up an ADSL account for our landline. This also meant we needed a new phone for the house. After having a look at available phones, with built in answer phone, I decided on the Sagemcom Union Jack phone.
I ordered it off of Amazon UK, it arrived the next day.
As I’m a man I did not bother reading the instruction booklet, so it took me a little while to figure out how to set-up our new phone, and get it working.
Once I’d figured it out, it was a simple process which would have been quicker if I had read the instruction booklet, but where is the fun in that? 🙂
I must have been feeling patriotic when I ordered our new phone, and now it’s here the Union Jack design looks good in the lounge.
The Sagemcom Sixty is a good looking retro style phone, it’s cordless, and the built-in answer phone is handy. We like it!

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We moved into our new house in Easington Colliery, and one of the first things I did was get an internet connection sorted out. I decided to go with TalkTalk. A week or so later the internet adsl connection was live and I installed the D-Link N150 ADSL router that TalkTalk provided.
I had nothing but trouble with it. It would only ever allow a single WiFi connection, and needed to be rebooted every time I swapped from my Macbook to either one of our iPads or iPhones.
There was only one solution. Buy a decent ADSL WiFi router.
After researching online I decided to go with a Billion BiPAC 7800DXL Wifi Router which I ordered from Amazon.co.uk.
It arrived on Monday (I ordered it on Saturday), I wasted no time getting it out of its box and setting it up. First I thought it was not working, or I was an idiot because it would not work, but then I discovered the new phone point we had just had installed was not working, so I moved it to the old phone point, and after a couple of minutes it was up and running.
All of our gadgets connected to it, and at the same time.
We were ecstatic with joy that we could finally use all of our gadgets whenever we wanted, thanks to our new Billion BiPAC 7800DXL WiFi Router. Happy Days!

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After only a couple of days in our new house, we couldn’t resist any longer.
We purchased a television.

An hour or so of searching online at Amazon, reading reviews etc. and I’d made my choice.
I ordered a Samsung LED 46″ TV. 🙂

Our new television arrived the following day, just before lunch.
I signed for the delivery, and wasted no time unpacking the new purchase.
The set-up was super-quick, it took about 5 minutes, and we were ready to veg-out in front of the TV.
We may be living in a bit of a building site, with no proper furniture, but that doesn’t mean we would sacrifice missing our favourite TV programmes. 😮
We were instantly impressed with the picture and sound quality of our new Samsung LED 46″ TV.
It was such a pleasant viewing experience that we found it difficult to drag ourselves away from the television to get on with some much needed DIY.
Now we are eager to complete the house so that our lovely new Samsung LED TV can be moved to its new home on a permanent unit, and not be living as it is now on the floor.

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Warm beer does not make a happy worker. Our house may well look like a bomb site and it lacks a functioning kitchen and the entire property in in the middle of a complete rewire and new flooring but that does not mean we have to sup warm beer. The first item we purchased after buying the house was a Beko fridge freezer. It now takes pride of place in the living room because the kitchen is still a ‘work in progress’. It keeps our beer and cider cold and we even keep food in it. 😉